I have a love-hate relationship with movies chronicling the lives
and loves of Jewish New York smarty-pantses, largely because the
bulk of my exposure is a real film stereotype, in full-blown neurotic
mode, as presented by Woody Allen. Like Allen,
writer-director Baumbach clearly loves NYC. But
he gets a big thank-you for telling a story with characters who
are not so much A Type. That does not, however, mean that these
are average Joes and Janes. The Berkman family—mom Joan (Linney),
dad Bernard (Daniels), and sons Walt (Eisenberg)
and Frank (Kline)—is anything but.

This is a troubled, polarized family, with dad-worship on older
son Walt’s part and a deep need to be worshipped on Bernard’s
part. A post on IMDB, from someone who claims to have been a student
of Jonathan Baumbach (the director’s dad,
whom Bernard is modeled on), says that Baumbach Sr. is such a self-inflated
prick that he’d likely view this film as an homage to him!
The Bernard character is so over-the-top ridiculous that it’s
a tribute to Jeff Daniels’ considerable skills that he makes
Bernard watchable. Still, it’s a character so Out There you
almost wish for the treatment that George Clooney
employed in Good Night And Good Luck—he used real-life
footage of Sen. McCarthy because an actor carrying
on as McCarthy actually did would be dismissed as unbelievably exaggerated.

Like the two sons, you find yourself helplessly taking sides right
away in this movie (though really, both parents’ rather needy
tendency to “share” stuff about the marriage with their
kids is tantamount to abuse). A marriage unravels and two misguided
parents devise a custody scheme that is scrupulously equal…
and nothing like fair. Baumbach includes some very right scenes
of how kids react to family upheaval. Told that there will be a
“family conference” after school, we watch Walt and
Frank spend an entire day of dread, unable to think of anything
else.

Baumbach makes very nice use of music cues throughout The
Squid And The Whale (annoyingly named for a museum exhibit).
A lullaby by famously conflicted father Loudon Wainwright
(“Shut up and go to bed…”) plays in a scene at
Bernard’s, and then when Frank goes to Joan’s house,
we hear music by Kate McGarrigle, Wainwright’s
ex.

The boys’ reactions to the fractured family are extreme,
but both actors are up to the challenge. The older son, Walt, is
such a pitifully fucked-up poser that it is a testament to Eisenberg’s
(Roger Dodger) skills that he never laughs at his character,
though he lets us laugh at him. These boys are not bright, especially
Walt, who takes everything his dad says as gospel. And some very
adult acting is required of Owen Kline, who is not much older than
the 12-year-old character he plays, as Frank discovers his sexuality
and descends into some unusual acting out. But don’t get me
wrong—this movie is a comedy, a comedy of haplessness. It
would be full of unbearably uncomfortable scenes if these guys weren’t
such fools. In fact nearly every guy in the movie is some kind of
fool. And though Joan is not presented as particularly admirable,
she, and the other females in the movie, see the follies of males
pretty clearly.

And they say divorce is better for kids than fighting, miserable
parents?!?! Movie ends abruptly on Walt, who is less interesting
than Frank. Where you come down on this film is probably going to
depend a lot on whether you’re divorced, or your parents are
divorced. I’ll bet Noah Baumbach’s parents feel like
shit right about now…